Dear 2019,
Sweetheart, you’ve been a bitch in many ways, but I’ll still fondly remember you as the year I discovered the ugliness and the beauty and the struggle and the triumph that is therapy. It ain’t easy bearing your soul to anybody, let alone a stranger, but I’m so grateful you introduced us. Therapy and I are becoming fast friends, and with any luck, we’ll be badass accomplices for a lifetime.
I suppose since we’re on the topic of gratitude, I’ll indulge you a little more, 2019. You know the holidays have never been my jam, but in the spirit of this most wonderful time of the year, I suppose I’ll play along. (I refuse to drink eggnog, roast chestnuts on an open fire or allow Jack Frost to nip at my nose though.) Without further ado, here are 10 things your pen pal is thankful for:
1) It seems a bit on the nose, but worthy of note nevertheless. Of course, I am thankful for my family. Perhaps I am most thankful for Al’s recovery from back surgery and the debilitating pain that wreaked unbelievable havoc on his physical and mental health. I wish I could find something funny to say about this journey (you know how I love deflecting with humor), but being a helpless bystander to chronic pain, especially when it’s afflicting somebody you love with your whole heart, is its own special brand of agony.
2) While we’re on the subject of surgery, thank you so much for the leaky water bottle that ruined my laptop during my husband’s lumbar discectomy. Way to make sure it caused irreparable damage! The good news is, the medical bills will soon arrive, MacBook Airs aren’t cheap and this self-employed writer is always in need of a solid tax deduction!
3) Kudos for reinforcing my distaste for mainstream country music by proving that even when cued from a jukebox, the volume level of anybody crooning about pickups, booze and chicks is excessive.
4) Thank you for pushing me through all the miles and the training and spandex it took to cross the finish line of three more half marathons, and a back-to-back 5 and 10k. There was a time when this old lady didn’t think she could run four feet outside. (Now she’s setting her sights on a marathon.)
5) The fierceness of FBC! (Ladies, you know who you are.) I’m beyond grateful Fucking Book Club exists and continues to bubble with such wit, insight and tasty hot dips. (Btw, the cold dips and the book suggestions haven’t disappointed either.)
6) I write No. 6 in a bar on the Friday before Christmas. This particular watering hole is packed with people laughing and drinking and merry making. Nobody would likely describe themselves as working. Yet here I am, 2019, working. Despite its challenges and disappointments, I remain ever grateful for finding a deceptively difficult, rewarding profession that pays (sometimes) and I actually enjoy doing. (Plus, I can [sometimes] drink beer while doing it.) It’s all but guaranteed I’ll never be rich, but as the kids no longer say, YOLO.
7) Much appreciation for my lack of shame over my iPhone’s ability to kindly inform me how far away Adams Outdoor Advertising is from my present location. (Adams Outdoor Advertising appears to be code for Louie’s, Kalamazoo’s oldest bar. Somebody once told me, “The family that cocktails and eats deep-fried foodstuffs together stays together.” Well, it was something like that.)
8) For my favorite number, I express gratitude for the simplicity of the sunshine blinding me from the window. It’s December in West Michigan and seeing anything but a canopy of dirty tube sock is a Christmas miracle.
9) Yoga and tacos. (Oh who am I kidding, just tacos.) The past 12 months I've become a yogini at preparing and mainlining this traditional Mexican dish. (Who needs child’s pose when you’ve got the Zen of meat and tortillas?)
10) YOU, and by YOU, I don't mean you, 2019. I mean anybody who has made me smile or lifted me up in the slightest possible way the past 359 days (give or take). You’re the definition of The Whip Shit.
Merriest of whatever makes you merry, 2019. (Don't let the door of your immaculate gingerbread house hit you in the ass.)
--Amie
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